YORKSHIRE managed to secure the two further batting points necessary to make sure they went back to the top of the Championship table after their rain-hit match against Warwickshire ended in a predictable draw at Edgbaston.

They had also hoped to dismiss Warwickshire in a little over two sessions in order to pick up three bowling points but their attack was not up to it and they did collect any as the home side closed on 254 for two, captain Darren Maddy ending unbeaten on 135.

Sussex's trouncing of Durham on Sunday pushed them one point ahead of Yorkshire but Anthony McGrath made sure their stay at the top was only brief by taking his sparkling innings to 188 at which stage the Tykes promptly declared at 400 for nine with a maximum five batting bonus points in the bag.

It was a career-best score for McGrath whose innings spanned seven-and-three-quarter hours during which time he received 348 balls and struck 26 boundaries.

Ironically, his only chance came right at the end when he was 187 and Yorkshire, on 399 for nine, needed just one more run for a final batting point. He edged Heath Streak and wicketkeeper Michael Barnes dropped a fairly simple catch, allowing the batsmen to scamper the all-important single.

Barnes experienced sharply contrasting fortunes on his Championship debut because he held five catches in the innings but also spilled five chances,.

Yorkshire resumed on 313 for six with McGrath on 142, but 400 seemed a long way off as Jason Gillespie and Darren Gough got out quickly, Gillespie edging Naqaash Tahir's first ball to Barnes and Gough doing the same off Streak after slamming a couple of boundaries.

Yorkshire were sinking fast at 325 for eight but Matthew Hoggard gamely helped McGrath to keep the innings afloat with an invaluable ninth wicket stand of 71.

Hoggard was dropped on 22 by Barnes and on 30 by Michael Powell at slip but he also showed that he has more strokes in his locker than he is generally able to show for England.

McGrath, slow to warm up, spent 50 minutes adding his first boundary but he was as solid as ever and it was only the declaration which robbed him of his first double century.

Hopes that Yorkshire would run through their opponents' batting were soon dashed as Ian Westwood and Maddy put on 103 for the first wicket.

Hoggard then returned and had Westwood guiding a catch to Jacques Rudolph at first slip for 51 but Maddy and England's Ian Bell rattled up 134 against an assortment of eight bowlers, before Bell departed for 65, and the sides called it a day with 12 overs left.

* Yorkshire's Tim Bresnan has signed a new two-year contract which will keep him at Headingley until the end of 2009.